The Iridimi Refugee Camp houses over 18,000 refugees that have fled the Darfur region of Sudan. It is fully equipped with 14,000 solar cookers. A solar cooker production workshop was completed in early 2006, and since then women have earned income assembling the cookers and conducting trainings.

In early 2005, solar cooking was introduced to Darfur refugees living in the Iridimi Refugee Camp in Chad by Dr. Derk Rijks of the KoZon Foundation. Jewish World Watch’s Solar Cooker Project adopted this endeavor in 2006 and has expanded it to provide solar cookers and training to three refugee camps so far. Replacement cookers are provided for the families, which are made up of 5-7 people per tent, often one woman as the head of household, with up to three of her own children and three orphans.

The area is devoid of vegetation; there is abundant sun and very little rainfall—between 3” and 5” (7.5 - 12.5 cm) yearly. The main food currently distributed in Iridimi is maize meal, a food the refugees commonly eat. It is sometimes accompanied by a maize-soya-meal mixture, if available. The pulse plants most frequently distributed are yellow and red lentils, white and red beans, and sometimes pigeon peas.

An aerial view of the camp

These require cooking for about three hours, depending on the clarity of the sky. The heat from solar cookers is slow and gentle, so while the food stays longer in the pot, it doesn’t stick to the walls or need to be regularly stirred, which is an advantage over the potential to burn food with fire. Women can do other things while the food is cooking, without worrying about stirring. Additionally, there isn’t the lingering smell of smoke as there is with a fire—like women everywhere, these refugee women are conscious about their appearance, even in these very difficult conditions. Solar cookers are also able to be used to pasteurize drinking water, reducing incidence of water-borne diseases especially in children.

The Solar Cooker Project’s partners include Solar Cookers International, which provides technical assistance, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR,) which manages the camps and coordinates NGO activities, and Tchad Solaire ("Solar Chad"), the NGO that runs the project on the ground in Chad.

Organizations providing financial support for this project have included: Netherlands Refugee Foundation, Jewish World Watch, as the North American Coordinator of the Project, the Darfur Assistance Project, the Dora Levit Family Fund, and the Hesed Fund. Logistical and communications support from the UNHCR and CARE is invaluable in continuing project operations.

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News and recent developments

July 2011: A Goedhart Film production, TAHA CHAMCHIHA Solar Cooking in the Sahel, documents daily life for the Sudanese refugees living in camps in bordering Chad. Tchad Solaire has trained over 12,000 women in the use of simple solar panel cookers. These CooKits have provided the women additional free time normally spent searching for scarce firewood. Within each camp there is a workshop center where cookers are made for distribution to the other residents. Though the cookers are somewhat fragile, the women have appreciated being involved with the process of making the simple CooKits. The film also shows how the companion Guffahheat-retention cooker baskets are being assembled to use with the panel cookers to keep the food piping hot for dinner served in the early evening.

The Benefits of Solar Cooking

Solar cooking helps reduce the need for frequent firewood collection outside the relative safety of the camp, reducing the risk of violence towards women and girls.

Two solar cookers can save one ton of wood each year.

There is no need to tend a fire so women are free to do other tasks while food is cooking.

The production of the solar cookers provides income-generating opportunities for female refugees.

Solar cooking, as part of the Integrated Cooking Method, reduces the amount of wood necessary for cooking, helping to alleviate tensions between the refugees and locals, whose already slim wood supply was suddenly impacted by thousands of refugees.

What You Can Do

Help provide more refugee camps with solar cookers by raising awareness and raising funds. Make a donation! Just $30 supports one family by providing two solar cookers, training and two pot holders. See more information at: Help the Women of Darfur

Refugee women earn income by constructing cookers and training other refugees.

Tying down a CooKit solar panel cooker so that it can withstand the winds at Iridimi

When the training of all women in Iridimi camp was finished (May 2007) and all of them possessed 2 CooKits, they proposed to celebrate this at an Id el Tachashumshir (the staff counted 4200 CooKits in the sun)